Posted: 8/29/2005 10:15:56 AM EDT
| My wife's grandmother has an 98 Mazda compact car that she barely uses. She has about 16k miles on it right now. How often should she be changing the oil. It's almost 8 years old, does it need a tune up even though it has very low miles? |
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Yeah, you definately should swap the fluids. That's a long time for them to sit with that little use. Change the oil, change the antifreeze and bleed the brakes. Check the belts and hoses for any cracks as they might be a little dry. Spark plugs should be fine. Transmission fluid should be fine. She should change the oil at least every year no matter how many miles on it. Do you plan on inheriting the car someday? If so, tune it up for her and take care of it. |
For storage you are better off spending a few bucks on a battery tender and filling the oil to the max. When I store my bike in the winter I fill the oil all the way to top of the plug and hook up a battery tender to it. That way you have fresh oil in there all the time and the battery stays at a constant charge. If you start it up every month the battery drains then charges, and the oil gets contaminents in it which cause breakdown. |